USCAN Catalyzing Grants

Summary of Most Recent Grants
 

Grant period October 2023 - 2026

Funded 10 grants

Total Funding $520,000.00

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Backbone Campaign - Visionary Grants

Title of Grant: Global Solidarity with Indigenous Communities

Brief Description: The provided funding facilitated ongoing engagement and co-creation with the global Indigenous community, nurturing transformative perspectives rooted in ancestral wisdom. This support enabled the integration of Indigenous viewpoints to effectively address intricate climate and societal challenges, with a keen focus on justice and diversity. With these resources, we crafted living climate documents and actively engaged decision makers at and around the UNCOP, distilling our community's wisdom to fortify global solidarity. 

 

Organized, Uplifting, Resources, Strategies (OURS) - Collaborative Grant

Partners on Grant: OURS, EFC West

Title of Grant: Rooted Phase 3: Collaboratively Revitalizing Willington

Brief Description: Rooted Phase 3: Collaboratively Revitalizing Willington will regenerate a historically segregated school to bring much needed opportunities to one of the most endangered towns in South Carolina. This project aims to intentionally restore a rural community while providing a blueprint for other similar towns: restoring hope for revitalization, one rural community at a time. 

 

Colorado Farm & Food Alliance - Grassroots/Frontline Grant

Title of Grant: Strengthening Rural Climate Leadership

Brief Description: The Colorado Farm and Food Alliance centers front-line rural climate action by strengthening community-rooted leadership to 1) develop and implement on-the-ground climate solutions, 2) build advocacy skills and capacity, and 3) shape strategies for change; in the Gunnison River watershed of western Colorado. The Gunnison River is the second largest tributary to the Colorado River system and the area is already heating more quickly than most other places on the planet, making it a "hotspot," or "ground zero" in the climate emergency. It also contains vital public lands, including critical habitat and roadless National Forests, a large base of agricultural lands, and outstanding solar energy potential making it a region ripe for rural-based climate action. 

 

Selkirk Conservation Alliance  (SCA)- Grassroots/Frontline Grant

Title of Grant: Pillar Programs; Environmental Education, Environmental Advocacy and Scientific Research – Citizen Science Water Quality monitoring – frontline environmental conservation work northern Idaho & eastern Washington.

Brief Description: SCA is one of the last and only small, grassroots environmental nonprofit organizations working on the frontlines in north Idaho & eastern WA to protect conserve and restore the last remaining old growth forests, lower Selkirk Mountain lake and river systems, threatened and endangered species, intact functioning wetlands (and more) from rampant destruction. From government and agency meetings and plans to community sign-on petitions to boots on the ground conservation work SCA seeks to conserve our local environment by educating and engaging our local community members. It has always been folks working to protect their “own back yards” that have made the greatest strides in the environmental conservation and restoration movement! SCA and our members are working to protect the last strongholds for climate change we have in the Inland Pacific Northwest. 

 

Mt. Zion Community Outreach - Visionary

Title of Grant: Earth, Wind, Fire & Water - Securing our Future

Brief Description: Our proposed project is focused on Hornsby Middle School (6-8) comprised of students from a 83.2% BIPOC community that is marginalized, socio-economically disadvantaged, and disenfranchised community called East Boundary, or the ‘Bottoms’ area of Augusta, GA, where the residents surrounding the school literally sit in the of industry that contributes to rampant water, air, and land pollutants in our area. This school is considered a Title I school, meaning that it is not only situated in an impoverished community, but a school where funding is very limited and does not provide for curriculum that adequately addresses the negative impacts of climate change nor addresses environmental justice issues that affect their very existence. We will add our proposed project and one (1) instructor to our aftercare program, “I Choose Success”. Additionally, our proposed project would now teach parents and their middle school children of climate change and environmental justice issues that will empower them to recognize the hazards in their community that is directly attributable to the quality of air they breathe, the contaminants in the water they drink, and the land on which their playgrounds are located. Moreover, six faculty members of Hornsby participated in The Black Church – The Green Movement workshops that enable them to discuss climate change and environmental issues with students before attending our aftercare program. The impacts of climate change and environmental justice issues in our “I Choose Success” aftercare program will further educate and empower those who live in a community that has as a longstanding issue of pollutant industries in their back door. The students, parents and community will have the ability to mitigate these impacts through projects such as gardening, recycling, and even planting trees, as well as, cultivating ideas that will allow them to be at the table when policy is set that affects THEM and THEIR community.

 

Native American Environmental Protection Coalition (NAEPC) - Visionary Grant

Title of Grant: Leadership and General Support Project

Brief Description: NAEPC membership is open to any federally recognized tribe. Most of NAEPC’s member tribes are located in California with one tribe in each state of Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico. Most of these reservations are remote and rurally located. Typically tribes must drive distances of over one hour for any outside resources for home, health, education and office supplies or engagement. Even technology access remains a struggle. Environmental efforts are slow due to funds and staffing. Tribal communities are mostly impoverished.

 

Care About Climate - Collaborative Grants

Partners on Grant: Care About Climate, North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light,Minnesota Interfaith Power & Light, The Climate Initiative, Action for the Climate Emergency,  Fridays For Future USA (Non-USCAN Member)

Title of Grant: USA Youth Climate Policy Council

Brief Description: There is a growing movement to unify the voices of young people to empower increased ambition on climate action within the United States. The Youth Climate Policy Council will serve as a forum for US youth collaboration and climate policy coordination for existing youth climate organizations. By setting the infrastructure for capacity-building efforts, we are leveraging youth leadership and skills to proactively create change, rather than only respond to negative policies.

 

The Imani Group, - Collaborative Grant

Partners on Grant: The Imani Group & Mt. Zion

Title of Grant: The Black Church - The Green Movement “At the Water’s Edge”

Brief Description: The Black Church has been and continues to be the most impactful institutional voice in the Black community; moreover, it is not only a place where religious/spiritual practices take place, but it also serves as the Gatekeeper of knowledge and participation in larger society. However, far too many churches in coastal communities in South Carolina are unaware of the devastation that climate change and environmental injustice cause in the communities where they are located, but we will change that. The Black Church - The Green Movement "At the Water's Edge" has been exclusively designed for these coastal communities as an expansion of our original project.

 

The Imani Group - Visionary

Title of Grant: Project G.E.T. (Growth - Expansion - Transformation)

Brief Description: The Imani Group’s work has expanded beyond our immediate communities to impacting communities, agencies and academia statewide, regionally, nationally and globally on issues of environmental justice and climate change. For more than two decades, The Imani Group has been the face of environmental justice for the communities that comprise the Central Savannah River Area (CSRA) of Georgia and South Carolina. The CSRA is comprised of fourteen counties in Georgia and seven in South Carolina. It is named after the Savannah River which forms the border between the two states. The largest cities within the CSRA are Augusta, Georgia and Aiken, South Carolina. Please note that the CSRA does not include the city of Savannah, Georgia. In 2018, the total population of the CSRA was 767,478. Much of the population live in rural, agricultural and low wealth communities. Many of these communities are in close proximity to the Department of Energy's Savannah River Site, a federal nuclear defense facility, located in Aiken SC and the Southern Company's Plant Vogtle, a commercial nuclear facility, located in Waynesboro GA. These vulnerable frontline communities are not only impacted by these facilities but also other polluting industries such as large meat packing plants, chicken farms, nitrogenous fertilizer plants, plastic polymer plants, bio-labs, battery production facility, kaolin mining, etc.

 

The Peoples Justice Council - Collaborative Grant

Partners on Grant: United Women in Faith, Elders Climate Action, Mothers and Others for Clean Air

Title of Grant: Breath Again Collaborative: Healthy Air is Health Care

Brief Description: The Breathe Again Collaborative provides in-depth, research-based education and action opportunities for our own members and USCAN members, focusing on the health impacts of air pollution and the connection between climate change, air pollution, and environmental injustice. The same dirty fuels that cause climate change also produce air pollution that really damages our health, and when we reduce combustion fuels we not only fight climate change, but also immediately improve our health. In our third year working as a collaborative, this year we will focus on connecting local communities to regional Environmental Protect Agency (EPA) offices, exploring ways community activists can collaborate and work with the EPA to improve community health and well-being. 

Grant period October 2022 - 2023

 

Funded 15 grants

Total Funding $700,000.00

 

Agricultural Missions, Inc 

Title of Grant: Increasing People of Color Membership on Boards

Brief Description: This work will promote energy democratization in the local Electric Power Association space by engaging in advocacy and education of marginalized People of Color communities. This will lead to more grassroots led energy policy that will increase emphasis on and access to clean energy generating sources, mainly solar. This work will translate to other spheres where anti-democratic governance and inequities exist.

 

Black Women Rising

Title of Grant: Black Appalachian Coalition (BLAC)

Brief Description: Black Appalachian Coalition (BLAC) amplifies black voices, dismantles the colonized narrative of Appalachia, and uses story-based strategies and solutions that center the voices and lived experience of Black Appalachians. We connect and amplify voices through our listening sessions, BLAC Paper, “story map” on our website, and policy summit. We also are developing new leaders and increasing outreach through our Fellows Program. Our newest project is developing a toolkit to help people learn more about the issues and how to most effectively share their stories.

 

Care About Climate

Title of Grant: Empowering Young People to Be Their Best Advocates in Climate Policy Spaces

Brief Description: We hold governments accountable for implementing the Paris Agreement and prioritizing youth inclusion through our research and capacity-building work on Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). In particular, our NDC Project offers the only youth-led intergenerational and gender justice analysis of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to the Paris Agreement. Through training, mentorship, and education, the NDC project empowers young people to communicate the needs of their communities using data-driven analysis towards the improvement of their NDC.

 

Creation Justice Ministries

Title of Grant: Centering People and Climate Impacts in Faith Communities

Partners on Grant:  North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, Virginia Interfaith Power and Light,  Interfaith Power and Light (DC.MD.NoVA), Union of Concerned Scientists - unfunded partner

Brief Description: Through Centering People and Climate Impacts in Faith Communities, we partnered to strengthen the work of climate resilience in faith communities in Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. Our approach is three-fold: strengthen grassroots relationships in the states, deepen our understanding of community-based climate resilience through research and peer learning, and set up structures for sustainable, ongoing engagement with these communities

 

EcoEquity

Title of Grant: US Fair Share Collaborative

Partners on Grant:  The People’s Justice Council,  ActionAid USA (unfunded partner), Climate Nexus (unfunded partner),  NC Interfaith Power & Light (unfunded partner),  Southeast Climate & Energy Network (SCEN) (unfunded partner), Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO)(unfunded partner)

Brief Description: The US Fair Share Collaborative aims to engage US climate and climate justice groups much more closely with the rapidly evolving international climate equity and fair shares debates, with the specific goal of putting the US fair share in the emergency international climate effort firmly onto the movement agenda. Such a strategy is needed to shift the conversation from what is considered “possible” to what is actually necessary, both as a moral mandate and in frank acceptance of the scale of the climate crisis. Only when the movement clearly articulates an international fair shares politics as part of an overall justice forward analysis will we be able to mobilize at scale.

 

EFC West

Title of Grant: Southwest Tribal Adaptation Menu

Brief Description: This work will serve to recruit volunteers and develop content for a Tribal Adaptation Menu through meetings and interviews with Southwestern Tribes on their adaptation needs and local and regional impacts from climate change. This climate "road trip" will collect data and visually record climate impacts, adaptation and mitigation measures that can be integrated into an eventual Adaptation Menu, specifically designed for Southwestern Tribes.

 

Elders Climate Action

Title of Grant: Breathe Again Collaborative: Healthy Air Is Health Care

Partners on Grant: Mothers and Others for Clean Air, United Women in Faith,, The People's Justice Council,  NC Interfaith Power & Light, GA Interfaith Power & Light, GASP, Moms Clean Air Force and Climate Nexus

Brief Description: The Breathe Again Collaborative provides in-depth, research-based education and action opportunities that focus on the health costs of air pollution and the connection between climate change, air pollution, and environmental injustice. In the second year of this grant, we will explore how working with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can help improve the health of our communities. This includes learning about and educating others about the role of the local & regional EPA offices, connecting the community to EPA tools, resources, and funding, and advocating to the EPA through public comment and testimony. In addition to our work with the EPA, we will also focus on partnering with local organizations, like Arm and Arm, to take direct action that will address the impacts of air pollution and protect communities.

 

Mt. Zion Community Outreach

Title of Grant: Living in the Shadows of Nuclear! 

Partners: Kingdom Living Temple,  Mt. Zion Community Outreach, Inc., The Imani Group, Inc.,

Whitney M. Slater Foundation, 

Brief Description: The "Living Under the Shadows of Nuclear" will empower and educate frontline communities living in the shadows of commercial and/or federal nuclear facilities. We will interface with management and/or representatives from those facilities, teach community members how to create their own emergency preparedness kits and response initiatives, and how to develop Community Benefits Agreements with these industries. We will train these community members that "you can not get ready, but you have to be ready"!

 

Newark Water Coalition

Title of Grant: The Newark Water Coalition Training Center

Brief Description: The Newark Water Coalition established a training center in order to build power from the grassroots up. The training center will certify Newark residents and all residents of the North Jersey area with the knowledge they need in order to seek out lead assessment certifications. This training center gives both community members a new avenue in workforce development as well as creating a self-sufficient way to fund the service work of the Newark Water Coalition.

 

Organized Uplifting Resources & Strategies

Title of Grant: Rooted Phase 2

Brief Description:  The work of the proposed grant will be phase 2 of the ROOTED project. In this phase of the grant we are looking to secure land to serve as the hub for the edible organic landscape and demonstration site. This will be a multipurpose educational center and serve as home to Farm OURS. This will house all of the programs in one location and people will be able to come and receive training through hands-on learning and education. We will also be able to provide some type of stipend for participants' travel, training, and other opportunities.

 

Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania

Title of Grants: Climate Resilience, Environmental Justice, and Community Health: Protecting Frontline Communities from Radioactive Pollution

Partners: Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania, Georgia WAND, Imani Group, Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS)

Brief Description: Frontline energy communities are impacted by both the impacts of climate change and high levels of toxic pollution, with devastating health impacts. This project will develop public education materials and strategies for communities impacted by radioactive pollution from fracking and nuclear industries in Pennsylvania and Georgia, which are disproportionately Black, Brown, Indigenous, rural, and low-wealth, with poor access to healthcare and the economic and political clout to hold energy corporations, policymakers, and regulators accountable. In order to survive the hardships of the climate crisis, these communities and those like them must be informed and organized to hold polluters, policymakers, and regulators accountable for environmental cleanup, reparations for the harm they suffer, and resources for public health protection and medical care, as described in the Vision for Equitable Climate Action (VECA).

 

Sol Nation

Title of Grant: Sol Nation is Closing the Green Gap

Brief Description: Sol Nation is a small yet mighty team of fierce advocates, organizing around real, community-led solutions, rather than just the issues alone, in order to change the lives of Black and brown people and build a world where people and the earth are in harmony. We exist to identify and close the green gap between the desire of communities of color to live in regenerative and sustainable communities, and their access to power, infrastructure, resources, and education. We are mobilizing intergenerational communities directly impacted by environmental injustice through art, music, and culture, ushering in the next generation of environmental justice leaders by giving them access to knowledge and resources.

 

South Carolina Interfaith Power & Light

Title of Grant: 2022-2023 Climate Justice and Resilience Project

Partners: Creation Justice Ministries, North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, South Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, and The People’s Justice Council. These organizations comprise a collective organizing body known as Southeast Faith Leaders Network.

Brief Description: The Southeast Faith Leaders Network (SFLN) is a collaborative effort building long-term grassroots power and capacity among faith communities and frontline communities across the southeast region. Through this project, we are building on the success of our 2022 “Resilient Democracy” campaign by educating faith communities about the importance of participating in local advocacy and decision making processes while building a powerful movement that votes ahead of the 2024 election cycle. Given the significant role South Carolina and other SFLN states play in shaping national elections, SFLN will communicate the direct relationships of climate disasters, community resilience and democracy to voters.

 

Sustaining Way

Title of Grant: Voices of New Washington Heights

Brief Description: This project will amplify the narratives of community activists in New Washington Heights, a predominantly Black neighborhood in Greenville, South Carolina, through interviews with residents on their experiences with environmental racism and how they want to stop it/repair existing damages. Stories will be collected by local youth, and published in an anthology as well as incorporated visually into a living mural in a community garden. This will alert the general public about injustices Black residents face and empower the community as they work to make systemic changes in city policies.

 

Kentucky Conservation Committee

Title of Grant: Advancing Energy Democracy Through Public Engagement/State Utility Reform

Brief Description: The goal of the project is to provide resources to help citizens to understand how public agencies such as their Public Utility Commission/Public Service Commission provides oversight for utilities, and provide best practices and messaging for citizens to help balance the dynamic between the utility and the customer so that it puts the needs of the customers first. This will entail growing our base of allies in each state focused on how their utilities are regulated in order to make it easier for consumers to engage in the public process, and expand advocacy for lower bills, diversified, reliable energy choices, a just and equitable transition, and better climate resiliency. We intend to develop and pilot public education strategies and grassroots campaigns for energy democracy and utility reforms that give the public greater access to regulatory, legal, and democratic processes in order to accelerate implementation of climate and energy policy, emissions reductions, and a just and equitable transition to 100% renewable energy and share this work among the collaborating states.

 

 

Grant period October 2021-2022

Funded 19 grants

Total Funding $650,000.00

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Agricultural Missions, Inc 

Partnering with:  Kingdom Living Temple, Pee Dee Indian Tribe, The Whitney M Slater Foundation

Title of Grant: Implementing a Strategy of Awareness

Brief Description: Building on the achievements of the past year, this work will engage additional frontline BIPOC communities/groups in addressing both the impacts and causes of climate change; to build resilience and advocate for policy changes to promote the use of alternative energy sources. Specific emphasis on building locally controlled food systems through community based food production and the building networks and relationships with local farmers, where appropriate. Participating frontline communities will be engaged in awareness building and advocacy activities aimed at addressing the root causes of climate change and achieving a just transition. There will be deliberate efforts to engage youth in the planning and implementation of activities.

 

Agricultural Missions, Inc

Title of Grant: Increasing People of Color (POC) Membership on Boards and Committees of Electric dPower Associations (EPAs) in Mississippi.

Brief Description: In the state of Mississippi (MS) electricity distribution to rural communities is effected through seven EPAs throughout the state. In theory these EPAs operate as member owned cooperative associations where anyone with an electric meter is automatically a member of the specific EPA which provides the service. However, representation on the Boards of Directors and other committees of these EPAs by POC is not commensurate with their membership numbers. In order to achieve a just transition to renewable sources of electricity, it is necessary to increase the number of POC in leadership and decision making structures of these EPAs, primarily through engaging the 14 Farmers Cooperatives throughout the state.

 

Creation Justice Ministries

Partnering with: Wisconsin Green Muslims, Interfaith Power and Light-DC, MD, NoVa, United Methodist Women, Dayenu (non-founded), Green Faith (non-founded)

Title of Grant: BIPOC Faithful Climate Fellowship

Brief Description: Faith partners active in USCAN implemented a second year of the “Faithful BIPOC Climate Action Fellowship” for 25 BIPOC Christian, Jewish, and Muslim 18-26 year-olds across the U.S. Fellows receive training and make a commitment to the following climate justice priorities: to get published, create art, promote climate justice in their communities, engage in public speaking, or develop support resources for BIPOC climate movement emerging leaders.

 

This year Black Climate Action Network in partnership with four other Black led Climate orgs (O.U.R.S, Black Women Rising, Sol Nation and People’s Justice Council) will work together to create space to build the capacity for Black Climate leaders and black led climate justice organizations to center ourselves in healing and liberation as we build towards climate justice.

 

Organized Uplifting Resources & Strategies (O.U.R.S)

Partnering with: Black Women Rising, Sol Nation, People’s Justice Council, SCEN

Title of Grant: Black Folks Healing

Brief Description: This year Black Climate Action Network in partnership with four other Black led Climate orgs (O.U.R.S, Black Women Rising, Sol Nation and People’s Justice Council) will work together to create space to build the capacity for Black Climate leaders and Black led climate justice orgs to center healing and liberation as they work to build towards climate justice.

 

Southeast Climate and Energy Network (SCEN)

Partnering With: Imani Group, Power Shift Network (PSN), Organizing Uplifting Resources and Strategies (O.U.R.S), Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Center for American Progress (CAP), Climate Advocacy Lab, Care About Climate

Title of Grant: Beneficial Agreements for Effective JEDI Based Cross Climate Negotiations with Legislators

Brief Description: In recognition of the divergent tactics used within the climate community for legislative advocacy, and in recognition that this non-uniform code of advocacy has at times caused harm, leading to the discrediting of other climate movement organizations, Southeast Climate Energy Network (SCEN) and partners propose to meet and align by working out standard agreements around our interactions that are imbedded within a Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) framework. This climate legislative advocacy strategy will be non-partial due to the use of a third party mediator and a partnership that spans the broad spectrum of climate organizations. It will be effective due to consulting with political strategist and congressional staff member. The outcome will be a unified front where stakeholders do not have to undercut or exclude one another in negotiations, but instead collectively build momentum and enhance our impact with legislative officials.

 

Mothers & Others for Clean Air

Partnering With: Elders Climate Action, The People's Justice Council, United Methodist Women, NC Interfaith Power & Light, and GA Interfaith Power & Light.

Title of Grant: Healthy Air is Health Care Trainings

Brief Description: Provide in depth, research-based, virtual trainings with a focus on health effects and health costs of air pollution and climate change for USCAN members with a focus on those working in the Southeast. Training topics include the dire human health impacts and increased healthcare costs from both air pollution and climate change, which are both caused by the same thing: burning fossil and other fuels. Indoor air pollution will be one of the focuses to highlight that as solutions are pushed to reduce air pollution and address climate change, people need to ensure that they are not being sealed into environments with toxic air. 

 

EcoEquity

Partnering With: ActionAid USA, Care About Climate, NC Interfaith Power and Light, Center for Biological Diversity (non-funded), Friends of the Earth (non-funded), The People’s Justice Council (non-funded), Women’s Environmental and Development Organization (WEDO)

Title of Grant: US Fair Shares Collaborative

Brief Description: The Fair Shares Collaborative, which was spawned at USCAN’s last physical annual meeting (2019), has been absolutely pivotal in the global effort of mainstreaming the “fair shares” challenge, and in helping put international climate justice onto the movement agenda. Still, the surface has only been scratched. It’s crucial now to radically deepen the overall movement's understanding of the global climate justice challenge, and in particular to link the vision of a fair global climate transition to the Green New Deal vision.

 

Georgia Interfaith Power and Light (GIPL)

Partnering With: Creation Justice Ministries, North Carolina Council of Churches, North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, Sustaining Way, South Carolina Interfaith Power and Light, Alabama Interfaith Power and Light

Title of Grant: 2022 GOTV and Resilience Efforts Across Southeastern Coastal Faith Communities

Brief Description: The Southeast Faith Leaders Network (SFLN) is a collaborative effort building long-term grassroots power and capacity among faith communities and vulnerable coastline communities across the southeast region. Through this project, SFLN are building on the successful coastal resilience pilot projects in Georgia and North Carolina, by extending these efforts to Alabama and South Carolina and joining with the power of each of these coastal faith communities to Get Out The Vote throughout the 2022 election cycle. SFLN will use the frame and lived experiences associated with coastal disasters and continued resilience as the primary motivator for these GOTV efforts.

 

The Imani Group, Inc.

Partnering With: Black Women Rising, First Faith Baptist Church, Mt. Zion Community Outreach Inc, Healthy4Purpose (non-funded)

Title of Grant: The Black Church - The Green Movement

Brief Description: ​​The Black Church has been and continues to be the most impactful institutional voice in the Black community. It is not only a place where religious/spiritual practices take place, but it also serves as the Gatekeeper of knowledge and participation in larger society. However, far too many churches are unaware of the devastation that climate change and environmental injustice cause in the communities where they are located; but we will change that.

 

Kentucky Conservation

Title of Grant: Just Solar Transition/Clean Energy Reform

Brief Description: The Kentucky Conservation Committee works in a nonpartisan manner to ensure that our democracy works for all citizens, particularly those most affected by environmental issues. The vision is for Kentucky to be a responsible steward of the Commonwealth’s land, air, water and biota, and for Kentuckians to understand that the health of their families, communities and economy depends on the stewardship of these resources. Kentucky Conservation Committee’s work focuses in four primary environmental issue areas: Climate Change, Clean Energy, Land Conservation and Biodiversity since 1975. This "Just Solar Transition/Clean Energy Reform" project is a significant project for our organization and our allies.

 

United Parents Against Lead and Other Environmental Hazards (UPAL)

Title of Grant: Strengthening Resilient Communities

Brief Description: UPAL is building grassroots capacity by creating a Community Controlled Fund and increasing climate resiliency in The Heights community of Petersburg, Virginia through the transformation of an historic USO building, formerly used by "colored" army troops, into a solar powered Community Resiliency Hub. The Hub, the first of its kind in Virginia, will offer solar panel assembly and installation training, Community Emergency Response Training (CERT) and will serve as the Petersburg Arm in Arm Hub headquarters. UPAL is implementing and expanding sustainable climate solutions through the advancement of this 100% Clean and Renewable Energy program.

 

Organized Uplifting Resources & Strategies (O.U.R.S.)

Title of Grant: Rooted

Brief Description: In many rural areas there are very few stores and health options for long living. One benefit of living in a rural area is being able to live off the land. Rooted is O.U.R.S.’ gardening program where we teach people about sustainability through agriculture. The goal of O.U.R.S is to show people how to grow their own food to sustain themselves in a food desert.

 

GASP

Title of Grant: Green New Deal for Birmingham: Phase II

Brief Description: The goal of the campaign is to develop a people-driven, grassroots climate action plan for the City of Birmingham that includes specific, justice-forward legislation and policy recommendations that can be implemented now. GASP launched the Green New Deal for Birmingham campaign this year (with seed funding from USCAN's 2020 member grants), during which time we have collected data (e.g., laws, policies, reports, plans, etc.) and formed implementation committees (outreach, policy, and communications & art). Phase II of the plan will entail monthly implementation committee meetings, film screenings, art contests, base building, and report drafting.

 

Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power & Light

Title of Grant: Building Bridges, Building Power

Brief Description: Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power & Light (WAIPL) forms relationships, educates people of faith, and builds power in spiritual communities to advocate for climate justice. In this project, Earth Ministry will support tribally-led climate campaigns including halting the spread of fossil fuel infrastructure in the region and restoring salmon in climate-warmed waters. Following the strategies of Northwest Native nations, Earth Ministry/WAIPL will engage religious leaders in response to specific requests from tribal leadership and oppose climate-damaging fossil fuel projects that have imperiled Native fishing areas, treaty rights, and sacred sites.

 

The People’s Justice Council (PJC)

Title of Grant: The People’s Justice Council: Supporting Frontline Fighters

Brief Description: The People's Justice Council (PJC), including the PJC program Alabama Interfaith Power and Light (ALIPL), is a Black-led organization whose vision is to create a world that is equitable, sustainable, and just. PJC engages and equips communities with tools to build power from the grassroots up for change at the policy level. The major thrust of PJC’s work is related to energy justice; specifically, reducing the energy burden of folks in historic redline communities in our backyard (Birmingham, AL), throughout the South, and beyond, helping our most vulnerable keep their lights on, heat/AC running, and roofs over their heads (i.e., no shutoffs/no evictions) under institutional racism and economic Apartheid made worse by COVID-19. PJC likewise works on the long-term policy and systemic/structural changes necessary to bring about lasting, regenerative change. The People’s Justice Council does this through practical implementation and policy advocacy.

 

Environmental Finance Center West (EFCWest)

Title of Grant: Assessing Climate Vulnerability in the Rural Deep South

Brief Description: EFCWest will work with four other Southeast Climate Energy Network (SCEN) organizations to capture local climate vulnerability knowledge in the deep rural south. The team will be conducting a series of assessments of three counties located in the states of Florida, Alabama, and Georgia with the purpose of learning about vulnerabilities related to climate variability alongside these communities and to improve their climate resilience.

 

South Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (SCIPL)

Title of Grant: Mobilizing South Carolina’s Faith Community

Brief Description: South Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (SCIPL) is positioned to rapidly expand its reach and impact, and to carry out its mission of empowering faith communities to create a just and sustainable future. Funding from USCAN will allow SCIPL to immediately expand our annual Congregational Energy Efficiency Challenge program from three to five congregations, and almost double the number of graduates from our Civic Engagement Academy, growing from 17 to 30.

 

Sustaining Way

Title of Grant: The Power of the People

Brief Description: Sustaining Way uses education, collaboration and advocacy to create sustainable, caring and equitable communities for current and future generations. Sustaining Way’s work focuses on bringing equity and environmental justice to marginalized communities through a unique, holistic approach that includes leadership development, youth education, community education centering around sustainable practices, the development of a comprehensive network of partnerships to bring needed resources into the community, and more recently, infrastructure building to further enable the community to advocate for themselves. To address climate change, environmental hazards, gentrification and racism in the historically African American communities in Greenville, SC, Sustaining Way will employ asset based community building, participatory leadership training, climate and sustainability education and technical assistance, and policy advocacy.

 

Georgia Interfaith Power & Light (GIPL)

Title of Grant: Drawdown GA for Congregations: Practical Climate Solutions for All

Brief Description: Over the next two years, GIPL will expand its practical climate solutions programming to provide congregations accessible pathways to implement the 20 high-impact solutions identified by Drawdown GA. GIPL will expand its base of congregations and Green Teams through statewide outreach in order to broaden the implementation of these climate solutions. Additionally, GIPL will educate and equip these congregations to take part in local, state, and federal advocacy to advance the implementation and accessibility of these solutions across the state and to ensure that the most impacted communities in Georgia receive the benefits of these solutions.